gamerdad Of course it may just be a case of new game syndrome but I played another couple hours into the story until I rightfully found myself in the true open world part of the gameplay. As it was there was another hour or so on rails as the story plodded you through a couple more quick tutorials on a few more of its myriad of systems. There are the standard mechanics of levelling and item management, but there’s also a little card game with odd and tricky rules to learn as you challenge npcs in the world. Luckily I won my first real game so I must have followed the explanation well enough. Either way, a few more rails guided me out into the plains and now I’m doing the usual stuff like fighting random encounters and collecting ingredients for portions as I reveal chunks of map. Onwards.